TY - JOUR AU - Oluwade, Bukola B. AU - Frimpong, Augustine Adu PY - 2018/01/30 Y2 - 2024/03/28 TI - Estimating Louisiana Crawfish Hatchery Production Function: An Application of Cobb-Douglas Production Function JF - International Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Invention JA - Int. j. soc. sci. humanit. invent. VL - 5 IS - 1 SE - Articles DO - 10.18535/ijsshi/v5i1.14 UR - http://valleyinternational.net/index.php/theijsshi/article/view/1061 SP - 4331-4336 AB - <p>It is an undeniable fact that the Louisiana Crawfish production over the years has been produced from wild habitats, mainly from the Atchafalaya River basin, which seems to be a factor of seasonality. Following the statistics of the total Crawfish production between 2004 and 2005 seasons, it was underscored that more than 82 million pounds of crawfishes were produced. Out of the 82 million capacity of crawfishes produced between 2004 and 2005, approximately 74 million pounds of Crawfishes were obtain from regular crawfish farms and more than 8 million pounds of crawfishes were harvested from natural habitats by the activities of approximately 1,100 fishermen. However, many of the crawfish farmers rely on natural reproduction system by unharnessed crawfish from the previous year or on mature crawfish that are stocked to produce young naturally. In addition, it is a fact that Crawfish aquaculture in the Louisiana State does not rely on hatchery system of operations. This has been a hindrance on the part of the crawfish farmers to stabilize the populating capacities of their ponds with crawfishes now (or currently) and in the near future. Therefore, this current study tends to model and investigate the Louisiana crawfish production with a control variable of hatching system by following the Cobb-Douglas production function/ theory. The study adopted a cross-sectional data collection procedure to sampled 320 crawfish farmers in the State of Louisiana with the help of Cluster random sampling technique. The study revealed that the engagement/involvement of crawfish farmers' in the hatchery system of production in the State of Louisiana are associated with the influence of labor cost and its availability; the cost of hatchery equipment; the size of the storage facility; initial estimation cost of capital; genetic effect of interbreeding; government regulation; and climatic conditions. The study recommended that the Louisiana State government and the other key stakeholders should do a frequent evaluation of the goals and performance of hatchery programs in a transparent manner to the benefit of the crawfish farmers, and also make available to the farmers with Federal and local government funds and expertise guidelines. Again, it was also recommended that policymakers should place a priority on research that will aid in developing solutions to potential problems and quantify factors affecting the relative reproductive success, and the long-term fitness of populations in order to influence the hatchery systems.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p> ER -